Telangana govt not to scale up testing, focus more on treatment now

HYDERABAD: Hinting that the state may not increase testing for coronavirus cases, the government has asked local authorities to focus on treatment first. The action plan for remaining days of the lockdown clearly specified the tasks, but testing and tracing is not part of it. A mobile application will soon be made available to enter data of all symptomatic people found in the fever survey.
“Testing should be done only for symptomatic individuals. Focus should be on treating patients, not testing,” the instructions, from top government functionaries to all departments concerned, said. Health officials have been asked to complete the second round of fever survey quickly. The directives said all symptomatic cases should be monitored on daily basis. Data collection of symptomatic would include name, age, gender and date of onset of symptoms.
In another important decision, out-patient (OP) services would resume at all government and private hospitals. District authorities have been asked to collect daily reports from hospitals on symptomatic patients and medical kits given. “If a symptomatic person insists on testing even after getting the home isolation kit, the officials must dissuade the individual from testing,” sources told TOI.
The instruction also asked oxygen supply be monitored on daily basis and proning sessions be done twice a day in all hospitals. “Audit of patients should be done in all government hospitals on daily basis. All medical department staff should be given Covid duty roaster and will be posted in wards,” the action plan said. In addition to this, special officers would visit all government and private hospitals on daily basis.
In addition to encouraging symptomatic people to be under home isolation, it also said the focus would be on drawing their attention towards using the call centre for treatment advice.